Crossroads

It was still dark inside the house, when Kalyani opened her eyes. She groped on the window-sill next to her bed for the small table clock. It was 5:30 am. She looked around to see what had woken her up. The room she shared with her grandmother looked orderly. Everything seemed exceptionally quiet. Her grandmother, as usual, was outside on the veranda chanting her morning prayers and there was a cricket crying somewhere among the tiny bushes in the small courtyard outside, but these sounds only seemed to add to the silence. Kalyani looked out at the veranda. Everything was in shades of blue and black. The courtyard of dried cow dung looked disturbingly peaceful. She fell back on to her bed, still feeling groggy from sleep and thought about what had happened yesterday.

A cab driver from Dubai! Everyone was so excited. ‘I will see my Kalyani well settled before I close my eyes.’ Her grandmother’s voice rang in her ears. There was such a sparkle in her eyes when she said it. Mother was skeptical at first but as soon as she was told that he has never touched alcohol in his life, she was thrilled. Her own experiences had taught her enough about alcoholics. She would have chosen a pauper over an alcoholic for her daughter. Kalyani wasn’t excited about leaving her mother and grandmother alone and going to a strange country with a stranger, but then again she must get married and go someday, might as well be now with a person well capable of fending for her. Everyone said such a connection is hard to come by. The sun was up now and she must finish taking a bath and washing the clothes before 7.30. Her mother did not like it if she was late for breakfast.

She had just finished sweeping the floor and dusting the scanty furniture around the house, when she noticed a visitor at the door. ‘Radha!’ she yelled and sprinted to the door. They hugged and Kalyani pulled the visitor in to the kitchen. ‘When did you come? Has your college closed for the vacation? My god you have grown so thin. Don’t you city girls ever eat?’ Radha was the daughter of one of the richest men in the village and she had been Kalyani’s playmate since childhood, much to the disapproval of their parents. She was doing her first year of MBBS in a city down south. She stayed in the college hostel and it had been more than 6 months since she had visited Chenur in the onam vacations. They were of the same age but Kalyani had given up studies after tenth standard. Her family was neither as rich as Radha’s nor were they as enthusiastic about girls being more educated than their prospective husbands. And unlike her friend, she was hardly interested in academics, so she felt no remorse for discontinuing her studies.

‘I came in the evening yesterday. We have three days of leave because of a strike. Let that be. What am I hearing, you are getting married!’ Radha hardly sounded excited. Kalyani giggled at her shock.

‘Don’t get so excited. The wedding is not tomorrow. The proposal came through my uncle… you know the one who is a match maker? He told grandmother about it and they spoke to the other family. They are going to come and see me tomorrow.’ She went on to tell Radha all about the proposed groom.

‘Are you happy?’
‘Yes, of course. Why wouldn’t I be?’
‘You mean you really want to get married so soon?’
‘What do you mean ‘soon’? I’m almost 17. Maalathi got married at the age of 15. She is 18 years old and a proud mother of two healthy boys. I also want to have my own family.’
‘But there is so much more to do in life before you get married.’
Kalyani laughed out loud at this. ‘Now you have started speaking like a city girl. You are studying and are going to become a doctor. What do I have to do? I’m the daughter of your house-maid.’
Before Radha could react to this, Kalyani’s mother entered the kitchen. Her face did not encourage amity. But at seeing Radha, she immediately changed her tone and graciously offered her tea or something to eat. She yelled at Kalyani for having made her sit on the rickety chair in the small kitchen. ‘I don’t know why you like to spend time inside this pile of mud and brick.’ She said to Radha. As she scanned through the kitchen, her eyes reached the sink were the vessels lay unwashed. Her mood immediately changed again and she caught Kalyani by the ear and pulled her toward the sink, ‘you haven’t even finished washing the vessels. What have you been doing? Is this how you are going to behave at your in-laws’ as well? Are you going to make me listen to insults from them? Why do you make life so difficult for me?’
Radha tried to defend Kalyani but to no avail. When the initial storm was over and her mother went out mumbling to herself, Kalyani said almost to herself, ‘May be it will be better for me to go after all.’
‘She will never get over the trauma of losing your father to that tramp.’
Kalyani let out a bitter laugh. ‘Ha! Losing my father? I never had a father. She never had a husband. He was jus a man who forced himself upon us, stole our money and went out with others like him, come home drunk and beat us as if we were pieces of iron in his workshop. The only good he ever did to us was to go away.’
Radha knew being in the house would only make Kalyani bitterer. They decided to go out and walk around in the woods. On their way, they met Maalathi with her son in her arms. They shared pleasantries and spoke for a little while and moved on.

‘She is happily married, isn’t she? You can see it on her face.’
‘Oh, her husband is a very nice man. He is very hard working and sincere and takes care of his family. He is hardly 25 but I hear he earns quite well in the city. I hope I will be like Maalathi one day.’
‘And you are hoping a cab driver is going to keep you happy. Don’t you have any ambition in life?’
‘You don’t understand. This is life for me. This is what I have to look forward to. The only ambition I’m allowed is to hope my husband doesn’t start fancying other women. What I don’t understand is why you have to waste so many years reading and learning and racking your brains when one fine day you will also get married.’
‘Because getting married is not the end of the world for me. I will work even after marriage. I will work and have children and manage a family and a professional life together, like most women do these days.’
‘And what do you get after doing so much, money? But you already have so much.’
‘No! It’s not the money. It’s the satisfaction of having done something in life, the fact that I can be independent.’
‘You have turned in to a city girl. I always knew there will come a time when we will not understand each other. We come from different worlds. Our priorities, our goals, everything is different. To you the world is full of endless opportunities and prospects. To me the world is my mother, grandmother and this little village where everything goes according to a plan; a plan that has never changed and has hardly any scope of changing: the men will work and earn money for the family. The women will take care of the children and the house and teach her children to become men and women.’
‘May be you are just scared of trying out new avenues. The world is changing and you need to change with it. That’s the only way to survive. Or else you get out-dated.’
‘But I don’t want the kind of change I see in you. I don’t want to gain so much knowledge. I don’t want to earn a living. I don’t want to worry about the entire world and forget about my family and friends. It’s true once you become a doctor, you will only have time for your patients. You will have to beg for time with your family. And even the time you get you will be worried about your patients. I’m sure you will handle it very well but I want peace of mind. I’d like my world to remain small. It reduces worries and makes life much more meaningful.’
‘So you will accept the proposal tomorrow.’
‘I don’t know. What if he isn’t such a good person as people say he is?’
‘But if he is, you will marry him?’
‘I’m still worried about my mother and grandmother. When I go they will be left alone here.’
‘May be you should leave them here and start your own life. May be you should get married.’
Kalyani looked at her friend with a knowing smile. Radha returned the smile. Then they both stared at the mud road that lay ahead of them. A little way ahead it split. One goes on further, up a little bridge over the river to join the main road that goes to town, while the other leads to the river. The river runs parallel to the main road. The two mud roads never meet.